Raw and unedited. From October 7, 2020 as a part of Virtual Orange Wine Week.
Austria has a long history of winemaking, but in general, modern winemaking is fairly young. The country’s wine producers are consistently evolving over time and it’s no wonder that Austria was one of the early adopters of the “orange wine style”.
The name orange wine was coined by UK wine importer David A. Harvey in 2004, and already in 2005 several Austrian producers started using this term on their wine labels. Some make their orange wine in the traditional Friulian/Slovenian manner – wild yeast fermentation, no temperature control and minimal use of sulphur – whilst others use the extended skin contact technique within a more conventional or ‘modern’ paradigm, to add a little spice to their white wines. No matter which way, many Austrian winegrowers following this path, the best of them manage to yield some of the most fascinating, characterful wines, enriching both the Austrian wine scene and the market in general.
The following wines were tasted for the seminar:
Christoph Hoch Hollenburger – Bowler
Jurtschitsch Belle – Bowler
Pittnauer Perfect Day – Savio Soares
Christian Tschida Himmel auf Erden Maische – Jenny & Francois
About Pascaline:
Growing up in the Loire Valley and detouring from a career as a philosophy teacher, Pascaline Lepeltier, MS is a sommelier based in Manhattan, NY. After working in Michelin-star restaurants in France, she moved to New York City to open and run the Michelin-star Rouge Tomate beverage program for 10 years. Her wine list was quickly recognized and in 2017 was named “Best Wine List in World” by The World of Fine Wine. In 2018 she joined as a partner Racines NY, one of the top wine destinations of NYC working alongside Chef Diego Moya and wine guru David Lillie. She is a Master Sommelier since 2014, and became the first woman to win the Best French Sommelier competition in 2018. This year she also became a MOF, “Un des Meilleurs Ouvriers de France” in sommellerie. She teaches at the International Culinary Center as well as with the Court of Master Sommelier and the Wine Scholar Guild, and is a regular guest speaker for international congress and seminars. Pascaline writes a monthly tribune for the most important French wine publication, La Revue du Vin de France, and is preparing her first solo book, to be published in 2022. Finally, she makes a little bit of natural wines from organic historical hybrids with her partner Nathan Kendall in the Finger Lakes, NY, under the label chëpìka.